UPDATED TO FIX ONE LINE THAT WAS PIVOTAL TO UNDERSTANDING JARETH'S STRONG REACTION

(OOPS...! SORRY GANG. I've bolded the line in the text to make it easy for people who have already read it, to find it.)

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, although I'd happily snog Jareth within an inch of his life given half a chance. :)

Warning: Mature content as always…. If you can't hack a bit of kink or reconcile punishment with love, just skip down to the line marker toward the end of the chapter. You won't miss anything important and will pick up the context in time for the next chapter.

Today's episode features Dark Jareth *swoon*, somewhat controversial (as it turns out from reviews and PMs) consensual violence, some lemon peel, with a promise for lashings of lemons coming soon! :)

Notes on Comments: Loving the comments gang…please keep them coming! :) Replies to reviews are at the end. I'm finding it endlessly amusing how people thing the dream in Ch. 24 was cruel to both the readers and J/S…heck… both got something out of it *lol*

For those that asked about the baby…Lil Miss Grizzleguts is currently teething (at 8 weeks, heaven help us!) so I spend a lot of time trying desperately to figure out how to make her happier so I get more time to write (can you say – first time mother?). Other than that, I think her first words are going to either be "It's not fair" or "You have no power over me" because I've been watching 'that movie' so much while I write (and when hubby isn't home since he doesn't care for it).

TIES THAT BIND

Ch. 26

As soon as Sarah dissappeared, Jareth vanished from the hall. Unfortunately for Sarah, she mis-aimed herself again and landed on the vanity in the other cell. Jareth on the other hand, materialized in Sarah's training cell just in time to hear the crash as her water jug hit the floor. Leaning against the wall, he waited for her to appear in the right cell.

"You're late, Sarah," he said quietly as she arrived, his eyes glinting seriously at her, "Was I not clear that you were to be on time?"

To say Jareth was surprised by Sarah's actions while she was in Derick's cell, would be an understatement. The previous day he was worried enough about her control to wonder if she was going to harm him; now, she was exhibiting a much stronger sense of control, despite her fear and then anger at Derick. And on top of that, her level of cruelty was, at least to him, arousing.

However, what he really wanted to know at this point was whether she would tell him the truth about what she had just done.

He watched intently as Sarah stammered, taking an intense interest in the toes of his boots. In all the excitement of running into Derick, she hadn't considered what she would do when she saw Jareth, or what she would tell him.

Jareth moved to stand before her, placing the tip of his crop under her chin and using it to lift her face toward his.

"Well?" he asked, watching her squirm under his gaze.

"I… I didn't know how to get to the cells, so I tried to transport myself and ended up in the wrong place," she blurted out.

Sarah was pleased with her answer. Technically she had told the truth and couldn't get in trouble unless he wanted more detail.

With a small smirk, Jareth feigned interest and nodded. "Did you now, pet? And just where did you find yourself?"

"In a different cell," she replied, hoping she looked more relaxed than she felt, even though she was still telling the truth.

Jareth leaned in close to her, his lips lightly brushing the skin near her ear as he whispered, "Even if you didn't have guilt written all over your face, precious one, I would still know you have been up to something."

"Why?" she gasped feeling him near and being keenly aware of the heat coming from his body.

"Because you are still wearing the Goblin Queens' regalia, pet," he smirked, his eyes shining mischeviously. "Now do tell. Why would you be wearing the Goblin Queen's armor at this time of morning?"

Before she could stop herself, she made matters worse.

"Damn."

Jareth pulled back, frowning at her with distain as she blushed. Sarah chewed on her bottom lip as she considered how to answer. She didn't know which would be worse for her, lying to Jareth again and about something more serious than she ever had before, or telling him the truth and risking his displeasure at what she did while in Derick's cell. Evasion seemed the best course of action.

"Well, seeing as you are so fond of wearing it in the morning, " she continued, gesturing at his own regalia, "I thought I'd try it, but once it was on, I couldn't figure out how to get it to go away again. I'm not used to clothing that I actually have to summon."

'At least it is partially true,' she thought, hopefully.

Jareth chuckled darkly, his eyes narrowing as he spoke low, his voice carrying a distinct warning, "You are almost too clever for your own good, pet. So far you haven't told me an outright lie, but you are getting very close. You are already in trouble for cursing, again, and the flippant answer you just gave, so I suggest you think very carefully before you open your mouth again. Now where were you and what have you done?"

Sarah sighed heavily, apparently evasion wasn't a good tactic. Either way she was screwed – and not in the way she'd like. She already was in trouble for cursing and being cheeky, she was pretty sure that she didn't want to risk incurring more of Jareth's anger.

So she came clean.

"I mis-judged when I tried to come to this cell and ended up in another cell in another part of the dungeon," she began. "Imagine my surprise when I ended up in a cell that was occupied by Derick," she continued, her voice picking up a low, taunting quality, "I thought you only stole children, Jareth."

As soon as the last syllable left her lips, Sarah gasped and clapped her hand over her mouth when she realized how she had just mocked him.

With a growl, Jareth grabbed her arm, spinning her and pulling her back tight against his chest, her arm twisted behind her and pinned between them as he snarled in her ear, "You've gone too far now, precious and you will pay dearly for that little remark."

He marched her toward the chains on the wall. With his knee pressed firmly in her back and her chest thrust against the wall, he fastened the chains around her wrists and ankles. Sliding his hand through her hair, he jerked her head back sharply, "So you want to play do you, pet? Then we'll play. And this is a game I will always win."

She heard him move away and the chiming sound that she associated with him transporting himself. With him having left her, she sighed and began to thump her forehead against the stone wall in front of her.

'Great way to start the day, you idiot,' she muttered to herself. 'Torture the guy who raped you, then piss off the Goblin King, not just by breaking his rules, but insulting him. Oh you are a smart one, you are!'

Groaning she thumped her head a bit harder and continued muttering, 'Honestly woman. You get that armor on and lose all connection between your mouth and brain. Of course, seeing him in his armor does the same thing to you – all rational thought goes straight out the window. Really! On what planet did insinuating things you know aren't true about Jareth seem like a good idea?"

As she continued thumping her head against the wall and grumbling at herself, it took her a few minutes to realize she was hearing a steady creaking noise behind her that sounded suspiciously like leather.

"Jareth…?" she asked, hesitantly, feeling herself blush hotly. "You're still here aren't you?"

"Yes," came the cool reply, as he watched her whack her head against the wall harder, making herself wince. "Do you really think banging your head against the wall is going to help?"

She tried to shrug, but with the way her arms were chained above her head it came out as a strange sort of head jiggle.

"Well, something has to drive the lesson home."

"I have a more effective method," Jareth drawled, a cruel smile playing in his pale eyes.

Shutting her eyes, Sarah cringed. This was going to hurt.

"Can I say something first, please?" she asked quietly, resigned to what she was sure was to be a painful lesson.

"Continue," he replied, his irritation with her apparent.

"Honestly, I didn't mean it, Jareth. I'm really sorry."

"Not yet, pet," Jareth retorted, removing his cape and tossing it aside. "But I assure you that you will be very sorry before I am through with you."

Sarah heard the swish of something whipping through the air, microseconds before it hit her, a bruising thud punching her in the shoulder. A flogger – plaited leather she guessed from the stinging that emerged after the initial thud subsided. She really hated floggers, hating them almost as much as she was afraid of canes.

"Apologize again, Sarah and keep apologizing. Don't you dare stop or it will be worse," Jareth commanded her, slamming the flogger home again.

She stammered apologies with each stroke. The strokes didn't really hurt, yet – but she knew about floggers, and the pain would build. Sarah knew Jareth was cruel and this was just another example, but she knew the potential consequences for crossing him, and she did it anyway.

After several minutes, Jareth moved close to her, grabbing a handful of her hair in his punishing grip, "Sarah, do you have any idea the pleasure we could be having if you would just learn to control yourself?" he purred in her ear, making her tremble and gasp.

"But no, you insist on giving in to your impulses. If gave in to my every impulse I would've thrown you down and fucked you senseless the minute you opened your bloody mouth in here today," he growled, then swiftly moved back and swung the flogger even harder, making her yelp and twist in the chains, partly from the pain, and partly from the fact that he had cursed at her, and considering how he felt about such things, she knew he was very, very angry.

"So now, I'll have to use other methods to release my frustrations on you," he said, a darkly malicious smile creeping over his face.

They continued this dance of punishment and frustration for nearly two hours, Sarah crying out her apologies many different ways, while Jareth mercilessly swung the flogger. He watched with supreme satisfaction as her back was criss-crossed with impressions from the plaits of the flogger.

As she predicted, the pain built, until she was writhing, her body pulling hard against the chains as she whimpered with each stroke. Sarah, for her part, was truly sorry, her head hanging more from shame than the flogging itself. Her tears fell hot against her chest as they dripped down her cheeks and nose. She wasn't only crying from the pain, but from the fact that she had hurt him with her careless words.

Jareth finally stopped as the first light bruises began to appear along the top of her shoulders, while Sarah hung panting against the chains, seeming to lack the strength or inclination to stand any longer. He released her from the chains, before grabbing her by the collar around her neck and draping her over the vault horse shaped apparatus, pinning her firmly with his hand.

"Do not move from this position, for any reason, Sarah," he warned, his voice dark and foreboding. He took off his doublet and breastplate, before rolling up the sleeves of his shirt. "You can dispense with the apologizes now, and return to exorcising the more colorful language from your vocabulary."

Sarah wasn't sure what to think, and didn't have much time to process thoughts anyway as he struck quickly with the first blow. She yowled and jerked against the horse as a stinging line of pain seared across both sides of her ass.

'A cane. Great, first floggers and now canes. Today really couldn't get any worse,' she thought, dreading the impact of the next stroke. Of all the beatings she took willingly at the club, canes scared her the worst. No matter what you do, they do only one thing – hurt!

Knowing that Sarah was afraid of canes thanks to Derick, Jareth thought this was as an excellent way to refresh her memory regarding his distaste for expletives. He proceeded to cane her for over an hour as she whimpered, screamed, shrieked and finally sobbed obscenities. Unlike the day before however, she never once directed them at him, nor did she knowingly or unknowingly invoke her magic.

Her body was covered with sweat, cane marks, flogger tracks and faint bruises when he finally stopped. He pulled Sarah up from the horse, but her legs refused to hold her, so he scooped her up and placed her on a small cot in the corner of the room. Thrusting her onto the cot, he swiftly attached a chain to the collar and left without uttering a single word to her.

Sarah curled into a ball on the cot and cried for him, for herself and for the love she was sure was dying.

Elendra entered the cell sometime later, her violet eyes concerned at the sight that greeted her, Sarah curled into a tight ball, sleeping fitfully, her face bearing the tracks of her tears. Elendra laid a tray of bread, fruit and spring water next to the cot as she knelt down, gently moving strands of Sarah's hair from her face.

"M'Lady, you need to wake up now," she said quietly as she touched Sarah's arm. "Come on Lady Sarah, you need to eat something."

Sarah rolled away from Elendra to face the wall.

"Stop calling me that and go away," she replied with a soft sniffle.

"I can't stop calling you that, it is who you are, M'Lady." Elendra replied simply.

"I am no one. Nothing. Now leave me alone."

"Don't be silly. You are the Lady of the Labyrinth and the future Queen of the Goblin Kingdom. Now, his Majesty has sent me here to make sure you eat something before he returns. So please, sit up and eat."

Sarah refused to move.

"You hate me so much that you would risk the king being displeased with me for not getting you to eat?" Elendra asked, a slight frown on her lovely face.

With a heavy sigh, Sarah sat up, plucked a grape from the tray and ate it.

"There, you can tell him I ate something, although I don't know why he'd care if I ate or not," she said, laying back down with her back to Elendra. "Now leave me alone."

Elendra looked at Sarah sadly. "You honestly believe he no longer cares, M'Lady?"

Without turning around, Sarah sniffed and began to cry again. "How could he? I can't control myself and I said something horrible."

"If you truly believe that one careless comment would change the way he feels about you, then you are sillier than I thought," Elendra said, shaking her head at Sarah.

Leaving the tray next to the cot, Elendra returned to her rooms.

Sarah laid there for some time, wallowing in self-pity and trying to figure out how she could make Jareth see how sorry she was when he wouldn't even speak to her. She was dozing when she felt a gloved hand caress her cheek.

"Being stubborn and not eating will not make things better, Sarah," he began, torn between wanting to comfort her and shake her for being so pig-headed.

"I suppose it won't do any good for me to ask you to go away," she replied dolefully.

"You yourself gave me control, so the answer to that is obviously no. I will do as I think best when it concerns you and at this point, you need to eat," he said, placing his hand on her shoulder.

Sarah shrugged her shoulder, pulling it away from his touch.

"Don't push me on this, Sarah. I have no qualms about force feeding you if I must," Jareth retorted firmly. "You have the choice, you can sit up and eat and we can talk about this, or I will force feed you."

Jareth leaned against the horse and watched her as she gingerly sat up, her back and ass tender against the roughness of the cot. She purposefully avoided his gaze, appearing to examine the food on the tray intently, before pulling an apple from the plate. Still not looking at him, Sarah began to eat the apple, pausing periodically to lick the juice from her lips.

"So tell me pet, why do you think I would no longer care? Do you really think my love for you would stop merely by insulting me?" he asked gently, trying to understand her feelings. Elendra had told him what Sarah said, and he could not fathom how she came to this conclusion.

Absently tucking her hair behind her ears, Sarah swallowed a bite of the apple, considering how to reply. She looked up at him, emerald eyes shining with inner pain.

"You left and didn't say anything, I thought it was because you couldn't stand to be around me anymore. It felt like you didn't want to forgive me, because you wouldn't let me try and make it up to you," Sarah admitted quietly, her pale face reflecting her pain at the thought of losing his love.

Jareth smiled quietly at her, his eyes softening. "Pet, that is what the initial punishment today was for. The punishment was given and obediently received, as far as I'm concerned, the matter is now closed."

"For you perhaps," she sighed, frowning. "I'm not sure why, but it just isn't that simple for me. I can't seem to forgive myself and I still feel like I need to make you understand how sorry I am. Like I need to do something to make amends."

"Precious, what could you possibly do or say to show me how sorry you are, that you haven't already done today?" Jareth asked, his voice dropping as he looked into her eyes.

Jareth had been involved with many women over the years, both fae and mortal, and had yet to meet one with such a strong feeling of needing to atone when she had wronged him. Sarah was truly one of a kind and it made his heart ache that he couldn't make her understand that the punishment was given, the incident now finished.

Without giving herself time to change her mind, Sarah dropped the half-eaten apple onto the tray and rose from the cot. Jareth watched her with interest as she glided across the floor of the cell toward where he lounged against the horse, her eyes fixed on the floor at his feet. When she reached him, she knelt before him without a word, her teeth worrying her bottom lip as she tried to figure out how to make herself clear.

"Please, I have to do something to make this right, to show you that I'm sorry," she pleaded softly, never lifting her head or eyes, so her hair fell in a velvet curtain in front of her face.

As he looked down at the woman he had desired for nearly two centuries kneeling at his feet, Jareth felt his heart lurch in his chest. He knew what she was offering and what it cost her to make the offer.

"Precious one, I know what Derick did to you, in public no less," he began, a leather gloved hand reaching out to caress her cheek as she blushed furiously. "You can't even bring yourself say what it is you are offering me or look me in the eye as you offer it, yet this is what you feel you need to do?"

Unable to find the words in her heart to explain, she merely nodded, trying to ignore the tears that burned behind her eyes.

Jareth looked at Sarah intently. He had had many women make this offer over his lifetime, but there was none he wanted to accept as much as this one, but he needed her to be sure. Yet, at the same time, if this is what she felt she needed to do, denying her would be unwise.

Holding out a hand to her, he smiled tenderly, his mismatched eyes steady as they held her gaze. If he was going to accept her offer, he was going to do everything in his power to make up for what Derick put her through.

"My love, I have a proposition for you. I want you to go to your rooms and rest. If you still want to do this after we dine this evening, I will accept your offer. Is that agreeable?" he asked gently.

Sarah smiled at him and nodded, relieved that he didn't turn her down.

With a mischievous smirk he looked at her as she took his hand and stood. "Mind you, pet, over dinner I expect you to tell me what you did to Derick. You seemed to have made quite an impression on him."

She blushed furiously, ducking her head as if to hide.

"You aren't mad?"

"Mad?" he laughed, his eyes alight with wicked glee, "precious, it was marvelous!"

Author's Note: I'm thrilled y'all liked the 'Sarah Smack-Down' on Derick. *lol* That confrontation could've gone several ways, but it was interesting to see how it panned out, as well as the subsequent fall-out for Sarah and Jareth as a result.

Regarding the 'punishment' in this chapter...it seems to have caused some consternation amongst the readers. I did give it to my betas (I only use them to address content, not for editing) one in the lifestyle and one not. I gave them two versions, one with the caning and one without. The three of us agreed that without it, something was missing. From my perspective, the caning is needed to make what comes shortly possible (and actually to move us out of this phase of the story faster). I will consider this chapter again after the next few and may do a complete rewrite of it.

Replies to Reviews

deliarose: sorry about the short Ch. 25…. It just seemed to be a good place to end it and I didn't get as much time to write today. Also, if Sarah did what she *really* wanted to do to Derick, she'd only get in trouble for not controlling herself, because what she had planned for him was far worse than what she did to Alander.

Serena24: Yeah…I thought originally that she might be mad about it, so it surprised me as well, but I totally get it. I would've liked to seen her hurt him more, but think that would've caused her more pain in the trials (not that Jareth would be mad at her, let's face it, he wants to rip the guy to shreds anyway).

Jinx1764: Sarah will get to see Derick again in a bit, I think.

holmsie: So…I loved your comment about the 'conversation' between J & S about this….but that is still coming up.